The C is for Changes
FIRST BASE: OLD FACES, NEW PLACES Good morning, it’s September 1st. The Boston Red Sox lead the AL Wild Card by four games. One of their former pitchers joins the wild-card leading Giants of the NL, and Jim Thome heads to L.A. Let’s dive into it.
First, Jim Thome, twelfth on the all-time home run list, has been traded to the L.A. Dodgers along with pitcher Jon Garland. Thome’s trying to win his first World Series in a 19-year career. Of the 11 people ahead of him on the all-time list, only five ever won World Series winning teams. A-Rod, at number eight, is also trying to win his first this year. If the Yankees face the Dodgers, that would just be one subplot of many (Torre vs. the Yankees, Manny vs. the Yankees, former New York teams vs. each other, coast vs. coast). Of the 11 people ahead of Thome, Hank Aaron, Babe Ruth, Willie Mays, Frank Robinson and Mark McGwire won World Series titles, while Barry Bonds, Ken Griffey Jr., Sammy Sosa, A-Rod, Harmon Killebrew and Rafael Palmeiro did/have not.
Joe Torre says he has to talk to Thome, who has exclusively been a designated hitter for the past two seasons, about playing first base. At the very least, the Dodgers will have an accomplished, expensive pinch hitter.
The Giants don’t have a space problem with Brad Penny: he’ll go straight into the fifth spot in their lineup, though not everybody’s happy to see him. I think, in the grand tradition started by John Smoltz this year of leaving the AL East for the NL, he’ll be fine, especially in AT&T Park. Or, to quote Seth Meyers’ Twitter feed from the moments after he was released by the Sox: “News From the Future: Brad Penny K’s 9 in return to NL.”
In Wild Card news last night, the Rangers battled back against the Blue Jays to turn 11-0 deficit into 11-10, only to give up seven more runs and lose, 18-10. Rod Barajas had two homers and Adam Lind drove in eight. The Rays beat the Tigers, 11-7, to climb to 5 back of the Sox. Other scores of note: Yankees 5, Orioles 1; Braves 5, Marlins 2; Angels 10, Mariners 0; and D-Backs 5, Dodgers 3.
SECOND BASE: YOU WIN, ESPN I have not been a Brett Favre fan. The last few years, I haven’t considered him an above-average quarterback. When it looked like he was going to retire, I was fine with that. Then he signed with the Jets, and I was fine with that too: anyone it bothered clearly hasn’t live in the NYC area for the last few years. That is: if I have to watch the Jets, at least Favre would make it interesting, and probably throw interceptions to my favorite team.
Then he retired again, and that was fine with me. Watching him was no great shakes anyway. Well, you know what happened. I tried to tune it out as much as possible, determined not to care, but when word finally came that he was on the Vikings, I realized ESPN had won: I watched the channel for hours. After months of effectively beating my brain with a hammer getting me to care about Brett Favre, they got me to care about Brett Favre, and I watched the first half of last night’s game with genuine interest. I care about Brett Favre now. I’m not sure I like this development, but I assure you, it’s not voluntary.
Funny Favre note: the Vikings play the Panthers this year. One of my friends is a humongous Panthers fan, but is realistic about Jake Delhomme’s inability to throw to the right team. For the Panthers/Vikings game, I suggested a twist on the fabled “Race in which the winner’s horse gets someplace second,” in which the participants merely switch horses before setting out. Have the teams switch QBs, then play the game. Only makes sense.
THIRD BASE: THE HEART OF THE GAME Last night, I watched a documentary entitled “The Heart of the Game,” largely about former Seattle high school basketball player Darnellia Russell. The documentary begins with Seattle’s Roosevelt H.S. hiring a new coach and follows that coach, a Tax Law professor, through his first season as he embraces the Gladwellian philosophy of pressing like crazy. They win there first game by 68 points, and eventually lose in the State finals tournament. The following season, Russell, a black student, enrolls in the largely white school and (easily) makes the varsity squad as a 14-year-old. Her dreams, it seems, are limited to joining the WNBA. The doc follows the team through the next five seasons, during which Russell leads the team to several state finals appearancs, drops out of school, becomes a mother, goes to court, and returns to the team after a yearlong ban against the Washington Interscholastic Activites Association’s judgment and plays her team toward a title, becoming a lightning rod for criticism in the process of… well, I won’t tell you how she fits in on the team. Two things are clear from this: one, you’ll never see a better documentary on the subject of women’s high school basketball, and two, Russell will definitely play in the WNBA. Neither of those testimonials really do the film justice, and by now you probably know whether it interests you or not — but if you need that final push toward queue’ing it up, consider this it.
HOME: OLIGARH Much has been made of Glenn Beck’s inability to spell “Oligarchy” on live TV, a wonderfully comedic moment that I saw live. But does it mean anything? The left has used it as another shotgun shell to fire in the “Glenn Beck is stupid” argument — and I assure you, Glenn Beck is not stupid. That doesn’t mean, however, that he makes any sense. Watch Beck for an hour and you’ll be captivated as he rails against virtually all forms of government, connecting his thoughts in sometimes a wonderfully entertaining manner: in the following day’s program, he managed to quote the full first verses of Beatles’ “Revolution,” with it cued up to enter the break. It was a wonderful piece of theater. Beck’s problem is that he’s against everything, and for nothing. He offers nothing in the way of solutions to the point where it seems that he has no worldview at all; and if you think of him as standing for absolutely nothing, he’s a lot easier to swallow. It pisses a lot of people off (Democrats, mostly), but if you can take the long view, someone who’s effectively a nihilist shouldn’t scare anyone that much. To quote another 60′s era performer: You can fool some people some time, but you can’t fool all the people all the time. Glenn Beck is a talented on-air performer the same way Brett Favre is, but that’s not going to help him on the field, or Beck with his actual revolution. He says he’s got a real solution, but I’m still waiting to see the plan, and until I do, I’m not worried.
